


Vivisection

by TheBadIdeaBears



Category: Ao no Exorcist | Blue Exorcist
Genre: Aftermath of Violence, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon - Manga, Character Death, Demon Okumura Rin, Demonic Experimentation, Graphic Description of Corpses, Halloween Challenge, Helplessness, Horror, Human Experimentation, Illuminati, Implied/Referenced Torture, Injections, Medical Torture, Needles, Poor Okumura Rin, Starvation, Vivisection
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-01
Updated: 2020-10-01
Packaged: 2021-03-07 19:01:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,900
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26752528
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheBadIdeaBears/pseuds/TheBadIdeaBears
Summary: After being sold out by Yukio, Rin finds himself in the clutches of the Illuminati and subject to their torturous experiments. Will this be his death? Or something worse?Written as part of the "Darker Oneshots, Halloween 2020" challenge over on Fanfiction.net.
Comments: 8
Kudos: 39
Collections: Darker Oneshots 2020





	Vivisection

**Author's Note:**

> Hi all, Holly and Pandora here today to present this fic! It was written as part of a Halloween challenge over on fanfiction.net (where we cross post all our fics). We're the first ones to post and there is a list of all participating authors in the end notes. That being said, we really hope you... enjoy is the wrong word, but we hope you find this a compelling read.

It must have been at least a week, maybe two? Longer? Rin isn't sure anymore. He stopped being able to keep count after three full days. Maybe it was the holy water they tried injecting into his blood, or just being stuck here with no way to escape, that screwed with his mind. After that it was hard to tell when one day began and another ended. Did he black out for a while? More than once? He barely sleeps as it is anymore, unless they knock him out with some kind of cocktail of sleeping drugs to stop him from shouting and screaming all the time. As tiring as that was, he hadn't wanted to fall asleep, not when he knew they'd do worse while he was unconscious.

Rin isn't even sure what time of day it is anymore. There are no windows in the room he's been kept chained up in and no clocks. No one here even seems to wear watches so Rin can't even sneak a look at those. After some time there, he starts to sleep when he grows tired—if he's allowed to; one experiment seemed to be some kind of sleep deprivation test—and otherwise stares at the wall.

At first he'd questioned _how_ Yukio could sell him out to the Illuminati. Aren't they still brothers, twins, stuck with each other no matter what? Did Yukio forget about everything they went through? Did he forget how many times Rin stood up for him when they were kids? Did he lose sight of the fact that the Illuminati are their enemy? How, Rin had asked himself, could Yukio possibly have done this?

But then Yukio came to see him on the... well, it doesn't matter which day anymore, and the look in his uncovered eye was so cold, so impassive, that Rin had to face facts he's been denying for a long time. There's something dark in Yukio, something wrong that he won't—hasn't—spoken to him or anyone else about, and it's going to be their undoing. Clearly Yukio doesn't care anymore, and whatever reason he's found to betray Rin like this is enough for him.

No matter which way Rin looks at it, he's screwed. No matter what he tries, no one will tell him what he's here for. Is their ultimate goal to kill him or are they going to keep him alive as long as possible so they can find out more about him? Are they looking for some way to use him to prolong Lucifer's life? Are they trying to resurrect Satan? With no answers, all he can do is wait for someone to bust him out... assuming someone will.

The door of the cell opens and two scientists enter. Rin doesn't even attempt to speak to them anymore—they won't tell him anything anyway. They may have been in to see him before. Were these the same ones who measured his reflexes using bullets fired from a machine gun? Or did they test the difference between wounding him with normal and then holy weapons? They're not the ones who injected him with holy water, he's mostly... well, half sure. Once he had the tip of a finger chopped off to see if it would regrow... which it didn't until someone else injected him with a demon elixir as part of another experiment. _That_ got a lot of excited murmuring, as did the experiment where they left both holy and normal daggers lodged in his skin to see if they would heal around the blades and at what speeds.

Realistically, he's stopped being able to tell the difference between any of the scientists by now. When everyone is torturing him it's hard to bring himself to care who's doing it.

“Procedure 87,” announces one of the scientists to the other in an almost bored voice, a mask across their nose and mouth. “Monitoring the effects of Lord Lucifer's venom on the subject.”

Rin's pointed ears prick up just a little. They're up to Lucifer himself?

“Loading the venom into the syringe,” says the other, drawing black liquid out of a vial. It's thick, sludgy and slow to pull and Rin's stomach twists at the thought of them bringing it anywhere near him. Under his skin he can feel his pulse racing—he's been fighting less and less as time's gone on, but everything in him protests at the sight of it.

“No.” His voice is scratchy and dry from lack of use.

The one holding the syringe steps towards him and he tries in vain to shrink away. His bound limbs ache from trying to move, having been still for so long.

“Administering the venom to the subject.”

The syringe flashes dangerously, the black liquid inside like the void of Gehenna itself, every drop seeming to promise doom to Rin. He tries to wriggle away again, pulling painfully on his bonds in a desperate attempt to escape. Right now he wouldn't care if he broke every bone in his body just to get away.

“ _No_ ,” he says again, his voice a pitiful whine. “Please no!”

“Subject shows reluctance for contact with venom,” says the first scientist, making a note on their clipboard, and Rin wants to scream but his throat is too dry.

“Should we sedate him?” asks the scientist with the syringe, pausing halfway to Rin.

“No need, he can't move anyway.” The first sounds bored again. “Besides, our instructions were to avoid sedation where possible for a more accurate reading.”

The scientist with the syringe nods and approaches Rin, ignoring his feeble pleas. Once before, when he was initially brought here and restrained, he was strong enough to resist the first injection they tried to give him by tensing his arm muscle, but all such strength has since left him. The point of the needle seems to hover over his skin for an eternity before he feels the telltale scratch of it piercing his body.

“No, no please no.” Rin's voice sounds distant and pathetic as the plunger depresses and the venom disappears inside him. His skin takes on a grey pallor under the harsh fluorescent lighting. Soon, the syringe is empty and the scientist pulls it from him. Rin can barely make any noise around his panting breath.

“Subject appears normal,” says the scientist with the clipboard, looking at the machines around him.

“Another failure?” asks the other, dropping the used syringe into a yellow bucket.

“It seems so,” replies the first, sounding bored and exasperated. Suddenly one of the machines begins beeping frantically, so fast it sounds like a shriek. “Wait.”

Rin's ears are ringing, his heartbeat racing and panting breath scarcely able to keep up. He struggles and jolts, trying once again to escape his bonds, as the scientists stare wide-eyed at the machines.

“His heart rate just skyrocketed!” says one—he can't tell which anymore. “I've never seen this kind of pulse reading before!”

“And his temperature's three times what a normal human being's should be,” says the other, scribbling notes on the clipboard. “His insides should be boiling!”

To Rin, they are—he's never felt such agony in his life before, not during his fight with Amaimon, not when they left a holy weapon lodged in his side for an entire day and night, not even when he watched Fujimoto destroyed by Gehenna. All he knows is pain and a desperate, all consuming need to _die_.

“Heart rate and temperature still increasing,” he hears as if from far away. “If this goes on much longer—”

Blue flames erupt from Rin, consuming the entire room and everything in it, and Rin feels something else taking over.

When Rin comes back to himself, his body aches, every inch of him thrumming with exhaustion. Screaming comes to him and he covers his ears, willing them to just turn off the damn machine.

_Wait, my ears... I can... the restraints..._

The screaming continues but the longer he listens, the less mechanical it sounds. If he's not strapped down anymore; maybe it isn't the machine? He opens his eyes tentatively; the middle of his vision is a grey blob as though he's been staring at the sun too long, but around the edges he can see rubble and burnt wood, metal poles bent beyond recognition, and blue fire.

 _Oh no_.

The screaming around him turns into words: he can hear people calling for help, shouts of anger and fear. Amongst them, he hears voices he knows—from a long way off he can hear Shura's harsh calls, and from nearer Izumo, screaming desperately for backup. He realises he's kneeling, and there's something on the ground underneath him, between his legs, but he can't see it for his temporary blindness. Blinking furiously, he tries hard to banish the after images, needing to know what's going on.

An instant later, he regrets it. Not only can he see with greater clarity the destruction of the landscape around him, but he also gradually comes to see bodies surrounding him. Most are strange to him, but then a sick jolt goes through him.

A short way off, he sees an achingly familiar head, the hair cropped short right to the scalp, and an askew pair of glasses, a broken neck. Konekomaru's mouth is half open, blood dripping from one corner, and his brown eyes stare off into space, unseeing and lifeless.

Rin swallows a wave of sickness as he sees Shima—or rather his torso. His waist is a mess of shredded gore, a few ribs and his spine starkly white against the red of his insides. With his arms flung wide and mouth gaping, he almost looks like he's demanding a hug. His legs are nowhere to be seen.

If it weren't for the bleached blond comb atop his head, Bon would be unrecognisable: his face is burnt and blackened, his earrings melted in his charred ears, and his eyes all but gone. Beside his remains lie his prayer beads, never to be used in ritual again.

Rin's hands begin to shake. This was him, all of this was his fault. No one needs to tell him so; he knows it in his heart and soul (if he has any left). The blue fire all around the carnage, the adrenaline he can still feel pumping through him, his own hands covered in blood...

Finally, Rin looks down, and feels his entire world come to a screeching halt. Below him, Shiemi gazes up at him, her green eyes wide and pained, full of tears. Her skin is white as paper and her breath comes in little gasps as her lips move.

“Rin...”

Rin's eyes move down further, taking in the sight of her chest, the front of her uniform. A gaping hole, red and ragged around the edges, yawns open before him, and with a horrible pang Rin realises exactly where the blood on his hands came from.

“Shiemi...” Her name feels sacrilegious to say—he doesn't deserve to say it, but he can't help it. “Shiemi, I'm sorry.”

“Rin...”

Her eyelids flutter, her mouth slackening and one final breath leaving her as she dies.

Tears spring to Rin's eyes, streaming down his face as he cups her pallid face in his hands. Blood smears her skin and a sob catches in Rin's throat. With nothing left to do, he screams.

**Author's Note:**

> So... yeah, that's the fic. Poor Rin.
> 
> We really enjoyed taking part in this challenge, along with the other authors (fanfiction.net handles): Alastair, ArgentNoelle, AsgardianHobbit98, Babyvfan, Bewdofchaos, Brenna76, Caldera Valhallis, Count Morningstar, CrimsonRaine87, DancesWithSeatbelts, DemonOfTheFridge, DemonShippingQueen, Desna, Drawingdownthemoon, Elleurs, Ferith12, FreyjaBee, HisagiKirigakure, HoshisamaValmor, Iceburg-sanCPX, Jadeile, Kakashi97, Kamil the Awesome, Karkatsbabe, Kittyface27, KurohimeHaruko, Max333, Nazaki-Sama, NekoPantera, Nissa Fox, PhantomGypsy13, Phoenixreal, Potashiamu, RayeMoon, Rhearenee, Sailor Silver Ladybug, SensiblyTainted, Serena.Jones.585, SereneCalamity, SesshomaruFreak, Seth’s Kiss, Shnuggletea, Sigan, Silirt, Silverstar, Spunky0ne, Starfire93, Tartarun, The Token, TsukikoUchu, WhatIDesireEternally, Wrath of Vajra, Xache, Yatsu Narurasuke, Yemi Hikari! Please kindly check out their Halloween oneshot (when they come out, because we’re posting during the entirety of October) and their other fics if they suit your tastes, and please heed their Warnings too, thank you.
> 
> Also special shout out to Seth's Kiss and NekoPantera, co-hosts of the challenge, without whom none of this would have happened.
> 
> Happy spooptober!


End file.
